How to sell your first travel video

At this point in the process, you’ve created a sample video, received a testimonial from your first client, and have created a list of potential clients you’d like to contact.

The next step is building the courage to make that first phone call.

Selling your services will not be your first objective, so there will not be too much pressure on you to begin with. First you will just try to find out who would be the right person to speak to about creating a video for their website.

If it’s a small or family-run company, then you will most likely speak to the business owner. For a bigger company, there will be a designated person in charge of online marketing.

You should start your conversation by introducing yourself and your company or services you offer. Then you may ask whether they have ever thought about using a video on the website.

If they say yes, then you can ask what has prevented them from doing it already. If they say no, then you can ask how they get most of their business so far.

Most companies will use a combination of traditional forms of advertising:

Offline advertising like flyers or billboards

TV commercials

Affiliates such as travel agencies or tourist information

They’ll also use online advertising such as Google Ads, which are quite expensive. This is when you can suggest that creating a video will be like a permanent Google Ad. Much like an ad on Google, once it makes it to the first page, it will be shown with a thumbnail and thus be more prominent.

You can also remind them that YouTube is the second most popular search engine in the world, meaning many people look for information directly on YouTube.

So with video, they can increase the number of inquires without having to continue to pay for Google Ads.

Best of all, videos create confidence in a business or product and increase the likelihood of the browser making a purchase; so videos will actually lead to more bookings.

You can then talk about what format the video will take.

It can include an interview with the owner and customer testimonials or simply be a video with nice background music and titles to convey their main message.

You can ask what makes their hotel or restaurant different and what they would like to communicate. This shows that you have a real interest in the company you might create a video for.

Most likely your potential client will not commit to a video straight away, but they will ask for an email with all of the information in more detail. So you should note down their personal email address and name in your Excel sheet, as well as note from when you spoke to them and when you will send the email.

Thank them for their time, and say that you would really like to work with them.

You will then create an email that will include all of the following information:

When and why you spoke to them

All of the benefits of video

All of the services that are included in your pricing such as:

Filming, interviews, testimonials

Editing, titles, logos

Uploading the video

Review process

Help with embedding the video on website (embed code)

Possible dates or timing for video shoot

Your contact details

After making the first steps toward selling your first travel video, you can wait a couple of days to follow-up on your first email with a phone call.

[Editor’s Note: Learn more about how you can fund your travels and make an extra income with photography, travel writing, blogging, and more in our free online newsletter The Right Way to Travel. Sign up here today and we’ll send you a new report, Profit From Your Photos: A Quick-Start Guide, completely FREE.]